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21 November 2011
What do Bunnies do at Thanksgiving Time? (I.e., what are your plans?)
My Bear and I are taking our Australian Shepherd to run and run and run at Cannon Beach, after which we will be eating a late enormous Thanksgiving dinner at a fine restaurant near our hotel. The only slight stress right now is packing for a few days for us and the pup.
The pups and I are driving down to my mom's house Thursday morning so kitty cat gets the house to herself. Dog show watching, eating and general chilling with the family will follow. At some point before we head home Friday afternoon/evening, we'll see my dad and hopefully my bff's family. Then I get to scrub the house for an upcoming houseguest while having "eek!" thoughts about the new job which begins Monday.
I'm heading over to my folks' house and then we're off to VA to see my aunts. Which is going to be horrid, because it will be a neverending barrage of 'why are you wearing that' and 'it is time for you to get a husband' and I'm sure my mother is probably going to bring something up that will piss me off and I may bite through my tongue.
Everyone is coming to our new house! We still have lots of boxes to deal with but the main living areas are pretty functional and the cable guy came today so we will have football!
My sister is making the turkey, my mom is making dessert, my brother is making his awesome potatoes and I'll fix all the sides and provide drinks. We all live pretty close to each other so everyone can fix what they're making at home and bring it here to warm up and eat.
Hopefully I will have this oven figured out by then. It keeps beeping at me and doesn't seem to get very hot. Hmmm.
We have always regarded ourselves (our family) as "Thanksgiving Losers," because try as we might, and we have, we have not been able, ever, to plug into a community for this holiday.
But now that Daughter is gone, we are very thankful that she is coming down for a few days, before her retail employment takes over her life and soul.
So, just the 3 of us, but with a different spin, it's grand.
And we are roasting a chicken or two, rather than a turkey. But dressing yams, etc.
We're having a couple of friends over and will eat a whole ton and laze around the apartment. We are having my cheesy potatoes too, TPS! (and a lot, lot more food. And I'm making sangria.)
Phew. We just returned from an early Thanksgiving with The Fella's family, which is always a lovely but somewhat tiring trip. My family is gathering a few hours north on Thursday. I decided we shouldn't drive six hours round-trip to spend less than six hours with family.
One of the many things I'm thankful for: the good grace and cheer with which my family took that demurral. Another: the chance to gather together with one side of our family today, and to be cozily ensconced at home again tonight.
So! The two of us will spend Thursday at home together for the second annual Pajama Thanksgiving: we stay in our PJs all day, I make a big spread, and we play board games and watch MST3K all day.
The menu:
- topsy turvy stuffed squash
- kale gratin
- pan-roasted Brussels sprouts
- broccoli with chili-glazed almonds
- mashed potatoes
- mushroom gravy
- chicken gravy
- sage and onion stuffing (yeah, yeah, it's really "dressing" because it's cooked not-in-a-bird, but it's always going to be "stuffing" to me)
- mini-pies: pumpkin for him, blueberry for me
- a small roasted chicken, mainly so I can have leftovers for sandwiches.
Since I was a child, the sandwich was really the main dining event: after our mid-afternoon dinner, the chief culinary goal of Thanksgiving was simply to stay up late enough to feel hungry again. That means I get to have a sandwich of cold turkey (this year, chicken) on plain white bread, a pile of potato chips, and a glass of cold milk. Oh yes.
Early AM Turkey Trot with some pals. Five miles, but it's a loop, so I might just do three, because I think I'm slowest. Watch NFL. Wait for leftovers to arrive home. Eat a little something something good. Show Friday, two shows Saturday.
I want to see the cheesy potatoes too. Mmm Elsa's squash.
I think we need to invent a British Thanksgiving. What should we be thankful for over here? The (successful) Norman invasion? The restoration of the monarchy after the civil war? (no thanks). Um. Thankful for no successful invasions in the last 945 years? I can eat a turkey for that.
In answer to the question: some local American friends may be "doing" Thanksgiving, but at a later date because they are busy for reasons connected with the British lack of understanding of American holidays (he's applying for a job and the application is due on Thursday, and involves seeking recommendations from American academics who are all on holiday...). I hope to experience Turkey Day one of these years.
I think we need the recipe for gaspode's cheesy potatoes.
British Thanksgiving could be interesting. I think the origins are linked to traditional Harvest Festivals, it's basically a celebration that the crops are in and you're probably not going to starve that winter.
Every year I make a huge spread for family and friends. This year, though - it's not going so well. My heart's not in it (this has yet again not been a good year for me) and as the emails from family & friends pleading off keep arriving, I wish I hadn't ordered the damn big turkey. Now I have to see if there's any way I can downgrade it and frankly I'd just as soon cancel it all together. I might do that yet and just skip this year. I mean I've made a traditional Thanksgiving dinner, the whole works, 18 pound bird, stuffing, potatoes, two pies, homemade bread, green beans, creamed onions, turnips, two kinds of cranberry, etc., etc., for anywhere between 10 and 40 people every damn year since the mid 80s and I'm tired. If nobody's coming for dinner except my daughter, brother and aunt, then what's the point anyway? Couldn't we just get Chinese? The universe probably would not explode.
Yeah, I'll probably be making a 17 pound turkey for four people on Thursday.
I drove 1,700 miles to Florida to spend the week with my immediate family (mother, sister, sister, brother). We are at the beach. The 1,700 miles to get here were not so bad, but the 1,700 miles to get home again are starting to prey upon my mind.
I don't have any plans (no family, and going to other folks' houses always ends up with me thinking, 'getmeoutofherenow'). I am looking forward to a 4 DAY WEEKEND, though. It does make me a tiny bit nervous that my colleagues in the UK will be working and I will probably come back to too many emails on Monday. But I will try not to think about it.
So, maybe chinese takeout.
Disclaimer: don't come running to me whining about little things like extra fat on your ass, heart attacks or strokes. You knew about all the fat going in.
preheat oven to 400 F
2lb potatoes, peeled and sliced (yukon gold, natch)
2 cups 1/2 and 1/2
2 cups whipping cream
1 clove garlic, smashed (this is the recipe; I usually use 4 or 5)
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp white pepper
3/4 lb gruyere cheese, grated
Combine first 6 ingredients, heat to boiling, stirring constantly
Spoon into buttered shallow baking dish
Sprinkle cheese on top
bake at 400 F for 45 minutes
reduce heat to 350 F for 30 minutes
keep an eye on them, and cover if the cheese gets too brown.
Mr. Ant, AntDog and I are invited to some friends' house. They are this completely normal family... Mom, Dad, two normal kids and Granny (plus two dogs and a cat) all under one roof. It's like a three-hour holiday in the grownup world.
Work, food with family, more work, snuggling with the Bees, and possibly a quick get together with friends.
Apparently "the bees" or "bees" is used to mean something so random and/or absurd that there is no other response. This explains its recurrent use on twitter I keep getting alerted to due to my user name, and I'm all for randomness and absurdity, so I am totally down with it. I am betting it comes from the Eddie Izzard bit.
OMG Cheesy potatoes will kill you in a good way. It's like the department pot luck all over again where I asked for the corn puddin in a crock pot recipe and could not in good conscience go through with it!
We're pretending it's not Thanksgiving. No point in cooking a big turkey for two (his family's all up in Maine and he has to work Black Friday, and my brother and his wife cancelled their gathering -- they accepted a last minute invite from my aunt to her country club, forgetting that they'd invited us over (nice, huh?) -- and my poor mom's in the nursing home), so Jon and I are just gonna sleep late and go to the new casino over in Queens. One of my students has been, and she says it's nice. I'm curious to see how many strays like us wash up there. It beats Denny's anyway.
Oh, pips, that's rough to have family cancel. But sleeping late and than head out for fun sounds like a good time!
And I can sympathize with the idea that holidays suck. I kinda hold my breath around the major holidays, waiting to see which particular poison tentacle is going to whip out of the holiday jellyfish and sting us this time.
I spent a brief portion of our recent visit to The Fella's family first trying to sideline a relative heading toward a difficult subject, then holding The Fella's hand under the table so he would have something to squeeze, and finally just sitting there with my gaze fixed and my inner voice hollering SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP WHY WON'T YOU JUST SHUT UP. That's another reason that Pajama Thanksgiving is so fucking great: it's just us and no one trying to make us feel guilty or inadequate for BEING US.
Me!!! I love the dog show! Even the silly little skits/special messages they do. And there's a How It's Made marathon on the Science channel from 9a-6:30p ET. Those are the best parts of Thanksgiving (excluding the whole "seeing my family and eating too many carbs" thing).
Thanks, Brujita, much appreciated. I'm just being a mopey grinch. Now that I'm home from work and have the next four days off (hallelujah), I feel a little better. I'm actually looking forward to the casino. Maybe we'll win!
And thanks, Elsa. It helps a lot to commiserate. And I love the phrase "Pajama Thanksgiving." We will likely be having a "Pajama Christmas" as well. Could be worse.
I will either roast the tri-tip I got today on special with some dressing and potatoes, or make a pizza.
Those cheesy potatoes need some of that chopped bacon you find on the salad toppings shelf. No, I don't mean Bac-Os either, but that other meat product. ;-P
Tonight is one of the drunkiest bar nights of the year.
But I am just not feeling it, and the booze is just not doing it for me lately.
I am so not getting dressed tomorrow, if not going full out unwashed hippie.
I may have to make stuffing. I feel the procrastination starting already.
Paper, smchaper. Powerpoints, smchowerschmoints.
I just had a wave of smartiness: since I'm roasting the chicken mostly for gravy during the meal and cold leftovers after, why not roast it tonight? That way, I can make gravy now, not in the bustle of cooking tomorrow, and juggling dishes in our small oven just got one big dish easier.
So. It smells like Thanksgiving in here right now. Hurray!
I don't think I've ever had dressing made with sourdough - sounds yummy. Mum always used stale white and wheat bread when I was growing up. Now she buys Mrs. Cubbison's premade cut up bread. The mister and I cheat with Stove Top, which is kinda silly as dressing is fairly simple to make.
I like dressing made with buttermilk but I could never get the knack of making it myself. However, if I start with a nicely staled sourdough, I can get very near the same flavor. With lots of onions, sourdough dressing roasts well with pork and beef as well.
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